Central Park, New York City, Guida per visitatori e cosa fare nei dintorni

Central Park is a 843-acre rectangle of green in the middle of Manhattan, stretching from 59th Street to 110th Street between Fifth Avenue and Central Park West. It is the most visited urban park in the United States, drawing over 42 million visitors a year.

The park was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, who won a design competition in 1858. Construction began the same year and required moving 10 million horse-cart loads of earth and planting over 270,000 trees and shrubs. The "Greensward Plan" transformed a landscape of rocky outcrops, swamps, and squatter settlements into what Olmsted called a "democratic recreation ground."

The park contains 21 playgrounds, 36 bridges and arches (each unique), 9,000 benches, and the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir. There are also the Central Park Zoo, Belvedere Castle (a Victorian folly that serves as a weather station), and Bethesda Terrace with its Angel of the Waters fountain.

What most visitors don't realize is that nearly everything in Central Park is artificial. The "natural" landscape was entirely engineered. Even the outcrops of Manhattan schist were arranged to look naturally scattered.

The park was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1963 and is managed by the Central Park Conservancy, a private nonprofit that raises 75% of the park's annual budget.

If you're on a Questo quest through Manhattan, Central Park is the stage, and every bridge, statue, and hidden path is a potential clue.